Suffering From Confusion
by Woe Kitten
Summary: A girl wakes up in Sweden Borgian Space and is haunted and tortured by Paul
1. Chapter 1

"Doc, I don't think she's gonna make it. Severe clotting and hemorrhaging in the frontal and parietal lobes, internal bleeding, spiral fracture to the wrist, compound to the tibia, shattered rib cage, and her knee is completely blown outta the socket. Should we use defib?"

"There's nothing else we can do. The tissue in her organs are already going through necrosis from the lack of proper blood circulation. She's done for. Forget defib. And for cripes sake, turn off that fucking music."

I felt like I was falling off the roof of a ten story building. My hair rippled ferociously as I accelerated downwards into pitch black nothingness. My ripped jeans and torn shirt grasped at the air as if the threads of my clothes thought that they would catch onto something. My body ached as I fell flat on my back on the hard concrete that paved the sparsely lighted room. Oddly enough, there wasn't much whip lash. After gaining back my breath, I sat up and tried to focus my eyes. After a few frustrating minutes, I could make out the small, dank room.

A large, closed tank filled to the brim with solution sat in the middle of the room. A large incubator type light reflected through the solution and off the glass, revealing a pale body, floating motionless inside. The boy

***

was fully dressed, in a cuffed, dirtied shirt with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows and baggy pants held up by old, thinning, red suspenders. His curly, black hair tousled through the still solution, framing his dead-white face. His eyelids were closed, and he was neither floating on the top or laying on the bottom. His body lay, suspended between the two layers .

I cautiously approached the tank and peered conspicuously at his face. There was no pigment in his cheeks, and dark bags under his eyes which immediately made me jump to the conclusion that he was a goner. My face remained a good three inches away from the glass that concealed his carcass. I could tell that the liquid was at a freezing temperature when my hand grazed the cold glass. Bringing my face closer and tilting my head curiously, I remained, staring in awe and confusion.

He couldn't have been in there for an extensive amount of time. His skin wasn't inflamed and his clothes weren't deteriorating. I found a lock on the opposite side of the sealed box. It hung loosely off the metal eyelet. Lightly, I maneuvered it off. No rust build up, no lime deposits, no nothing. I pushed the light sheet of glass backwards, and it bounced back on the three hinges. The liquid was clear and placid. I submerged my arm and tugged the boy's hand out of the liquid. Placing my index and middle finger on his wrist, I checked for a pulsation of the wrist veins.

"No pulse." I whispered to myself conclusively. Suddenly, his hand flew up and his fingers wrapped around my throat. I tried to swallow and swat his hand away, but the attempt failed. Blood filled my cheeks and I blacked out. When I came to, I saw the boy looming over me. He was completely dry, but still wore the same set of aged clothes. I was speechless. It took several minutes for me to regain my voice, and when I did, it was no more than a whisper.

"You-you didn't have a pulse."

"Dead people usually tend not to have one." He harshly replied. I clumsily got to my feet and inhaled the stale air, still configuring his words. I was damp; mostly the front of my shirt and my throbbing neck.

"Where the hell am I, and who are you?... And why are you not dead? Is this some kinda sick joke? Ten minutes ago, I was peddling down Main street on my bike."

"No, that was about eleven minutes ago. Ten minutes ago you got hit by a 18 wheeler. Fucking bastard wasn't even looking where the hell he was going."

"You're an asshole. Tell me where I am and who you are. And no more damn lies!"

"For your information, this is Sweden Borgian space. I'm Paul, one of the former ghost inhabitants of Kingdom Hospital." I shook my head in disgust.

"I said no lies!" He took several steps closer to me and I stumbled backwards to keep the distance between us.

"What? You don't believe in ghosts, Short timer? Doesn't make you insane if you do. Don't get me wrong, insanity isn't always a bad thing." He smiled wickedly and continued to advance, inching closer and closer, his face only a couple of precious inches from mine. His dark, curly hair was unkempt and chalky. Looking into his eyes was like staring into the center of a black-hole. I felt lost, entangled in his words, swallowed up by his eyes. I tried to break eye contact, but found that I couldn't.

He painfully tore my arm away from my side, my hand in his. Pain seared through my palm. Blue, thick smoke rose from our entwined hands and enveloped the air around us. I coughed to keep the musty smoke out of my lungs. Then he loosened his grip and backed away. I clenched my teeth in agony as I looked at the blistering cauterized symbol that scarred my hand. Two mirror images, bloody and calloused. I winced and breathed deeply, trying to abandon the pain, and looked up at Paul.

His thumb was placed between his two, dark, thin lips and his bony pinky shot up in some kind of bizzare sign.

"Welcome to the Kingdom, Short timer." He smiled wickedly.

"Why the fuck did you do that?" I screamed at him with my eyes watering intensely. He fumbled through his pockets and dug out a two ounce vile filled with a red, foggy fluid.

"This will help with the blistering and swelling." He offered, handing it to me. I hesitated and eyed him over. After a moment, I decided that it wouldn't hurt to at least try it. I gently fingered the tube and brought it up to my chapped lips, tipping my head back and practically inhaling the tasteless substance. My body locked up instantly and the glass vile fell to the floor, breaking into millions of shards.

"My breathing became extremely labored and every part of my body became numb. My head seethed and I tried to alleviate the pain by messaging my temples. Paul smiled and placed a hand on my convulsing shoulder. I shoved a finger down my throat to get rid of the poison, but nothing came up.

"It already absorbed into the lining of your stomach. Stuff works wonders, doesn't it?" He said, pressing his body firmly up against that of mine. My blood coursed through my veins and then started to cease. I looked up at him in horror. My senses weakened, and my body completely shut down. Paul was still snickering as I shrunk to the floor and died.


	2. Chapter 2

1The migraine subsided and I sat upright. I felt different. My skin was clammy and chalky white. I stared down and a chunk of broken mirror at my feet. Dark bags, like the ones the boys eyes were encircled with, also hugged mine. My lips were coal black. I opened my blistered palm, stared at the symbol, then up into Paul's mysteriously dark eyes. He offered a hand, I hesitantly excepted and he lifted me off the ground. My joints were stiff and sore, but I still managed to stand erect without toppling over into an unconscious heap.

"What happened to me?" I questioned, trying to keep my balance.

"The dizziness will go away eventually. It took me a while to get used to it as well." Paul said, changing the subject. A bell rang in the distance and caught his attention.

"I have a bit of business to attend to if you don't mind." He droned. "I don't completely trust you, but what the hell. There's not much you can screw around with." He sauntered out of the room to leave me alone and shaken. I zoned out for a minute, trying to remember the so-called-accident that I was in. My concentration was disturbed when the floor beneath me trembled and fractured. I stumbled backwards and steadied myself with the piping that lined the walls. Chunks of the ceiling quivered and fell, cement littering the floor.

I covered my head with my arms and slunk to the floor as the quake continued to bombard "Sweden Borgian Space". After what seemed like several minutes, the shaking stopped. I looked around, prying myself from beneath a sheet of concrete, coiled wires and rock.

"I'm getting the fuck out of here." I said out loud to myself. Stepping over the fallen chunks of ceiling, I hobbled out of the room and wandered helplessly through the sullen, dank, grey hallways.

I repeatedly passed door after door, pacing through the hallways, looking for a way out. Something told me that that would never happen. Something told me that I was stuck here for eternity. I felt like I was being followed, but when I looked over my shoulder, the hall was everything except doors and silky spiderwebs. I continued on suspiciously for quite a while until the stalker revealed himself. A teenage boy, leather-clad, tall and long haired appeared from the shadows. His gaze was just as deep and hollow as Paul's had been, but was more soft and sullen.

"New here to the Kingdom?" He asked. All I could do was nod.

"Anubis." He offered his hand in a polite shake, but when he noticed the cauterized symbol on my hand, all he could do was stare at it. Feeling foolish and ashamed, I lowered my hand.

"I see that he has already marked you." I stared down at the floor and again nodded.

"I can destroy you, you know. Any friend of Paul is an enemy of mine." He lifted my chin with his index finger and looked me over.

"But I feel like being generous. I'll set you free, but on one condition." Anubis paused, and I noticed that I was trembling frantically. "I mark you as well." Before I could respond, he had already branded a dog head on the opposite palm. This one blistered as well, but seemed to heal over a lot faster. A scream, that of a small girl, calling "Antubis" reverberated through the hallway.

"Mary needs me." He said, before once again, disappearing into the shadows.

"Wait!" I bellowed. But it was too late. I was alone, clawing through the dark corridor. A door to my left caught my eye. Pale light drowned out the dense black from the small rectangular window. I peered out into the entrance of Lewiston, Maine's Kingdom Hospital. I cautiously opened the metal door a bit and slipped through. I stood behind the security desk next to an old, scrawny man with large bifocals reading a dirty magazine. From what I could see through the sliding doors, it was raining heavily, causing puddles to form in the parking lot.

"Blondie no! That's Bobby's!" The man with the huge glasses scolded the German Shepard that was now digging in the cooler at my feet. The dog understood and backed away from the meatloaf, mumbling, "Otto, Tubby don't need it." I stared at Blondie, astonished at the dog's ability to talk.

I looked over the security guards shoulder at the four screens that represented the security cameras hidden in the hospital and the one at the emergency drive in. A red and white ambulance came to a sudden stop at the drop off. The two ambulance drivers scurried out, flung open the two back doors and carefully maneuvered the stretcher down the ramp. Another carried an umbrella and positioned it over the patient.

Otto didn't seem to realize that the ambulance had arrived. I tapped him lightly on the shoulder. He whipped around, found nothing, adjusted his glasses and looked at the screen. His finger clumsily found the button for the P.A. system and turned it on.

"Dr. Hook to emergency. Hook to emergency. Stat." Automatically, the doors slid open. A woman pushed a stretcher from behind, holding an oxygen mask to the patients purple lips. I shuffled out from behind the desk, into the rain and caught up with the paramedic. I held on to the metal side bar and stared down at yet another boy my age. His hair was plastered to his feverish forehead and around the bullet wound on the right side of his skull. His eyes were completely hidden beneath several layers of gauze. The nurse had carelessly tried to wrap an ace bandage around his throbbing wound, but the bandage was too moist from the excessive sweat that drenched the boys face and limply hung off the side. The wound was black with gun powder, probably ejected from the barrel of the gun at the same time as the bullet.

A fairly short, handsome doctor rushed down the hall towards the nurses, the stretcher and I. "Victim of a local school shooting. Unfortunately, he was also the gunman." The woman paramedic said at a quickened pace.

"Have the front desk call and alert the parents. I'll take him down to ER. Stat!" He took hold of the stretcher and I tightened my grip as we flew down the hallway directly for ER. The room was brightly lit and smelled of nauseating disinfectants and morphine. One nurse came rushing in, followed by several male doctors. She whipped out an identification bracelet and wrapped it around the boy's wrist. I picked up his limp arm and read the typed information:

Jason Armstrong. Caucasian Male. 15 yrs of age. Birth date: 7/23/89.

Dr. Hook pulled latex gloves over his newly washed hands and put on his surgeon mask. The lady doctor, Draper as the other surgeons called her, handed him a weird looking surgical tool that looked very similar to the tongs that people used to get hot objects out of a frying pan. He moved the loose flap of skin away from the bullet wound with his index finger and inserted the tool. Twitching it lightly from side to side, he worked the piece of metal out and it fell into his opened, latex covered palm .More blood trickled from the hole before Hook had a chance to wrap gauze around it. When he did, it immediately started to take the blood in like a sponge takes in water.

He flipped up a corner of the gauze covering his eyes and gagged, quickly replacing it and turning his head away from the corpse.


	3. Chapter 3

1"He's pretty much terminal. I'd give him a couple days, give or take." Hook said unsatisfied and grimly. "Get him to a nearby room and hook him up with A type blood and morphine. We're gonna try not to let this boat sink." Hook exited the room along with all but one nurse, who momentarily scurried into the nearby office that was attached to the room. I felt a cold chill run down my neck, a distinguished chin rest about my shoulder and fingers digging into the skin below both my clavicles.

"Awe. Isn't that sweet. Lil Short timer here found herself a mentally incompetent lunatic. What you going to do with him?" Paul taunted, tugging at the bandage wraps at his eyes, revealing two, empty, lifeless eye sockets. "Skull fucking might be a little messy." He laughed. I turned around to confront him and furrowed my eyebrows.

"Watch and learn, Short timer." He approached the boy's bedside, brutally wrapped his ice cold hands around Jason's neck and squeezed. Jason's breathing was faint, hoarse and choppy, his chest barely rising, he began turning a slight shade of red. I jerked my head around to stare at the heart monitor which had abruptly went from irregular beats to an ongoing moan.

"Stop!" I screamed at Paul and tried to pry his hands away from Jason's neck. "Dammit, stop!" I screamed again. Paul was laughing and with one hand I swung at his face. I clipped him right below the eye before he managed to grab both wrists and tackle me to the floor, pinning my sides down with his boney kneecaps and thighs. The monitor began to record his heart beat like it was prior to Paul's attack.

"You're really becoming a pain in the ass." He gently brushed my hair away from my pale face and tucked it behind my ear. I thrust the heel of my hand up towards his chin to break his jaw and get him to shut up, but he caught it in mid-air and observed the dog-head.

"I knew I couldn't leave you alone." He muttered, tracing the burn with his index finger. "You're going to have a hell of a time here, now that you are marked twice. Now I have to try harder to keep the bastard away from you." He hoisted himself from the floor and jerked me up with him.

"You have got to learn your place here, Short-timer." He sneered, turning away from me and drumming his fingers on the metal stretcher frame. "Let's give Anubis a little visit, shall we?" Paul smirked and cracked his knuckles hardily. I swallowed hard before he managed to whisked me through the tiled wall. Once again, I wandered aimlessly through Sweden Borgian Space, accompanied by Paul and the feeling of angst. Waves of light advanced across the dark hallway as the continuous static of the radio dulled my senses and inflamed my headache. Dim lights flickered on and off overhead and accented spiderwebs that lined the hallway. Another earthquake plagued the solid cement beneath us and convulsed uncontrollably for several minutes. Paul seemed unaffected by it all. Looming ahead in the darkness, a large specimen on all fours approached the two of us. It was huge, the size of a gigantic dog, but yet, it had an elongated snout and a large tail that trailed behind it.

"Anubis." Paul greeted the creature with a slight sense of hatred tainting his words. The creature bowed it's head and began to morph; fur becoming flesh, and snout, becoming the long, pale face of the boy Anubis that I recognized.

"Paul." The slender, lanky, leather clad boy responded.

"I assume you've already met Short timer here."

"Yes, in fact I have met your young companion. You really shouldn't just leave your toys laying around, someone could come and snatch them up." He said, coyly.

"Yes, well, just goes to prove that you can't trust Egyptian Gods to leave their filthy hands off of your own property." He hissed; his top lip curling back, baring cat-like fangs. I took several steps back, getting the feeling that this wasn't going to end pleasantly. Paul grasped my waist and for a second time, pulled me close enough to feel the stale cold nip at my cheekbones.

"I marked her; therefore, I own her."

"Well, I guess we BOTH marked her, therefore we BOTH own her. Gotta face the facts, Gate Keeper. Doesn't pay to be cocky." Anubis' eyes placidly looked over the young Paul and with some strange feeling, they seemed to laugh obnoxiously, knowing that they had caught Paul in his own game. Paul's head hung low, but through the curly black bangs he still continued to stare at Anubis and scowl.

"Sorry, Paul. I can't always play fair. Besides, look at her, she's barely capable of facing you, let alone laughing in the face of innocent, dying patients."

"She'll learn." He stated through pursed lips.

"Just watch your back, you meddling little migrane." Anubis once again morphed into his animal state, ushered a low growl and a vicious snort, and sauntered away, disappearing into shadow.

"Time to show you the ropes kid." Once again I was thrust through the wall, into a small, secluded hospital room. The light overhead was extremely bright; it hurt just to open my eyes. Across the room in one of those elevated hospital beds, a young adult male , about early twenties lay helplessly, each extremity of his body badly deformed. He struggled to breathe, his lips were chapped so badly that he could barely open them. His dark, mysterious eyes were blood shot and completely filmed over with tears and crust. His breathing was low and very throaty; hoarse.

"What the Hell are we doing here?" I questioned. A wide grin spread across Paul's face and he evilly snickered and sighed. He walked to the side of the bed and peered over the side into the young man's concrete eyes, staring blankly up into Paul's endless pits.

"So, how's life?" Paul breathed into his ear and laughed. Since the man couldn't move, all he did was follow Paul's eye contact; wide-eyed. Paul circled the bed like a hawk ready to dodge down onto it's prey.

"Livin' life on the edge? Must be hard to watch time pass before your eyes while your sittin' here, rottin' in this hospital bed." He continued to talk to the gentleman, a huge, sinister smile spread across his face. He slapped the patients face hard and issued a hardy laugh. The man's Adam's apple quivered as he tried to issue somewhat of a scream, but his vocal chords were completely shot and useless.

"Too numb to feel anything? Welcome to Hell." Paul looked over his shoulder at me and signaled with his chin to approach. I was helpless and frightened, and thought of resisting, but I knew it wasn't worth it, so did what I was told. He wrapped both arms around my shoulders, grasped my hand brutally from it's place on my rising chest and placed it, fingers down onto the man's chest.

"Put pressure on it Short Timer." Paul hissed in my ear. I hesitated, but after being prodded painfully in the lower back by his pelvis, pushed down slightly on the sternum. The chest cavity collapsed as I put enough pressure on my finger tips, and each of our entwined, but splayed fingers began to sink deep into the flesh. I felt the blood percolate between each, spread finger and was still forced to sink my fingertips deeper into the chest of the patient.

Blood bubbled to the surface where the man's bare chest was and began flowing over his emaciated sides and staining the stiff, white bed sheets. Soon, the tips of my fingers ruptured a heart valve and pierced through several layers of heart tissue. The thin, muscle fibers stretched as they caught between my fingers and tore away from the main organ. Blood spattered from the deep, menacing hole and dark sheets of red, chunky blood left lines of the uncomfortable, suffocating fluid trickling down my upper arms. Paul's maniacal laughter reverberated off the tiled walls and echoed down the hospital corridor, tainting the quiet silence with an unwelcome shiver of fear, and the quiet hum of yet another flat line heart monitor.

Paul's wrists relaxed and his fist enveloped mine as he struggled to pull it from the tar-like clot. My hands were caked in curdled blood, yet still drenched in fresh blood. I stared up into the eyes of my captor, and swallowed. He clutched in his right hand a towel and scoured the blood from the palm and the back of his hand. I just stood, staring at the red matter as it traced the lines that carved their way around my palm.

"Short Timer." Paul spoke to get my attention then launched the dampened cloth in my direction. I caught it and just stared at him for a moment, then patted dry the wet and then scrubbed away at the remaining. He dug his nails into my wrist and reeled me in to talk face to face.

"Short Timer, look. This is what it means to be in between. All of us, including that little bitch Mary have a duty to fill here in Sweden Borgian space. Do you understand, Short timer? Do you understand what the Hell this means now?" I didn't understand. I was far from understanding, but I nodded and pulled myself loose from his grip, unable to look him in the eye. I'm sure he saw me as a scared rat, wet, ashamed and petrified, just thinking of what could occur next.

He got behind me and wrapped his arms around my shoulders.

"Kid, I think you've got what it takes. I see that. Something that damnable gatekeeper can't. He wants to USE you. He doesn't want to help. He's a sucker. A hustler. You got that? Mary's a slave to him. He's going to use her as collateral."

"You don't know that. He has more brains and heart then YOU ever would. He's here to be a beacon to lost souls. You're just here to be that shadow that blocks the way." I felt more cold breath seep below my shirt collar.

"Don't be a smart ass, miss. It can get you into a lot of trouble here."

I lay back on the opposite wall, arms crossed across my chest, staring up into Paul Morlock's empty, lifeless eyes with an incomplete, but notable hatred. He was persuasive, probably something he happened to perfect before even death. He wasn't the beacon, but he wasn't shadow either. There was more history to this hospital then anyone would be able to retell, a lot of history from BOTH parties. The hospitals history ran deep.


End file.
